Swimming Home

by Mary-Rose MacColl

  Catherine thought for a moment. ‘Well, is there a risk that if you operate you’ll harm the patient?’

  Louisa nodded. ‘There most certainly is.’

  ‘And don’t you promise not to do harm?’

  ‘Hmmm.’

  ‘So maybe don’t operate.’

  ‘That’s what I think too. So what if the chap swears too much? I doubt we’ll find anything in his skull that causes it. Harry’s taught you very well. Most of my work is like this, deciding not to do anything. And when I do do something, it’s usually relatively straightforward. See, you could be a surgeon. You could be anything, my dear.’

  ‘Even a swimmer?’

  Louisa smiled. ‘Yes, even a swimmer.’ She looked at her niece. ‘But I’m not sure that swimming would be enough for a life. I can’t help thinking you’d want more.’

  ‘Aunt Louisa, when you said you weren’t a Christian, did you really mean it?’

  Louisa nodded. ‘I did.’

  ‘Do you believe in God?’

  She thought about this question. ‘I don’t know, Catherine. I really don’t.’

  ‘I don’t know either,’ Catherine said, swallowing hard. ‘Florence is Christian. I liked Sister Ursula a lot. I thought at one time I might be a nun.’

  Louisa smiled. ‘I think every girl thinks that at some time,’ she said. ‘I know I did. And I wasn’t even raised in a Christian household.’

  ‘Were you and my father close growing up?’ Catherine said then.

  ‘Oh my, yes,’ Louisa said. ‘They called us the twins.’

  ‘What was he like?’

  ‘Harry? Well, he was unexpected. My mother lost a child, a girl before me, and when I came, I think she and my father were overjoyed, a girl to replace Margaret, the baby they lost. But then, just a year later, along came Harry. Our mother was very busy. She was involved in the London School of Medicine for Women and then she found she was pregnant. It wasn’t easy for her. She had her work and then these two babies. He was happy, though. Harry was always happy. That’s what I remember.’

  ‘So you looked after him?’

  ‘I don’t know about that.’ Louisa thought back. ‘They were different times, Catherine. My mother was trying to do something so important.’ She regarded her niece. ‘When I was your age, my mother drove me mad. My sister who died, Margaret, had tuberculosis. Mama was convinced it was hereditary and that I would die too. I was sick when I was about ten, which didn’t help. Mama was wrong, we now know. It turns out Margaret died because she had cow’s milk from one cow only, which was what was recommended at the time. But it gave her tuberculosis over and over. If medical science had inched just a little further along, perhaps Mama would have worried less. But it drove me to distraction the way she ran my life.’

  ‘Did you know my mother?’ Catherine said.

  ‘Hardly at all,’ Louisa said.

  ‘Do you know if she was happy?’

  ‘I don’t,’ Louisa said. ‘Did she seem unhappy to you?’

  ‘I don’t remember her,’ Catherine said. ‘It was just …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Nothing. Just my father never talked about her. And I wondered, you know, if they were happy.’

  ‘Oh, I do know that,’ Louisa said. ‘Harry adored Julia. In fact, it was quite a joke in our family. Harry was smitten. And he loved you very much, as you know.’

  There were tears in Catherine’s eyes. ‘Aunt Louisa, I’m glad I came here. I mean, I miss the island. I miss Florence. But I’m glad I’m here.’

  Louisa swallowed hard. She couldn’t trust her voice to answer.

  Catherine had gone off to bed and Louisa had sat up to finish her reports. Now her niece was at her bedroom door. ‘Louisa, there’s someone on the telephone, who says you must come.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Louisa said, groggy with sleep. She was still in her dream, tired, so tired. She went downstairs, her feet cold on the tiles in the hall. Her eyes wouldn’t stay open.

  ‘I’ve been asked to say sorry for waking you up,’ a little voice said when she went to the telephone.

  ‘That’s all right,’ Louisa said, still half asleep.

  ‘Sally said to tell you it’s a beach.’ Sally was one of the midwives. ‘You need to come, she said. She’s worried about the footings.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Do you know the Danby Road?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘We’re the house at the end of the last row on the left off the road, the river end. We’re the one with a light out, Sally said.’

  ‘Tell her I’m on the way.’

  Louisa surmised the lad meant a breech, footling, and the midwife needed help with the delivery—quickly.

  Nellie was asleep but she found Catherine in the kitchen. ‘I have to go out. Do you want to come?’

  Catherine nodded quickly.

  Louisa went upstairs to dress. When she came down, Catherine was back downstairs, dressed, ready and making tea. ‘You won’t have time for that,’ Louisa said.

  ‘It’s for you. I’ll put it in a flask,’ Catherine said. ‘The driver’s waiting.’

  ‘Grab the whisky,’ Louisa said. Catherine looked at her in horror. ‘For the mother, dear.’

  They came to the house at the end of the row and the light was indeed shining out into the night. Louisa knocked on the door and they were admitted by a girl who looked like she should be asleep. The house was tiny; it made Louisa’s seem palatial. There were two rooms, one a kitchen and eating space, the other a bedroom. The kitchen was filled with small children, none older than six. The boy who’d telephoned, knowable by his face, still flushed with the cold he’d been out in, couldn’t have been more than five. Their father was working on the subway, the boy told them.

  Louisa could hear moans coming from the bedroom. They went in.

  ‘Nancy, is it?’ Louisa said to the woman. ‘You remember me from the clinic? I’m Louisa. We’re going to help you now.’

  Sally, the midwife, stood to go and see to the other children.

  ‘Sally!’ Nancy called out in alarm. ‘I don’t want no doctor.’ Many of the East End women were suspicious of doctors, especially women doctors.

  Louisa took Nancy’s hand. ‘I know what you’re going through. I’ve had a child too, you know, Nancy,’ she said quietly. ‘But the baby’s coming out feet-first, which we’d rather he didn’t. You’ll need two of us. Sally won’t go anywhere, dear.’ She turned to the midwife. ‘Stay by her side,’ she said. Then she noticed Catherine standing there behind her. ‘You go and look after the other children, would you, Catherine?’ Louisa said.

  Louisa was thankful Sally had been able to keep the mother calm; it was worse when they panicked. As the contractions intensified, they waited, hopeful. If worst came to worst, Louisa could do a caesarean operation, but she’d do everything to avoid it here in the home.

  As Sally comforted the mother, Louisa listened to Catherine out in the kitchen. One of the children said, ‘We’ve had no tea, Miss.’

  ‘Are you hungry then?’ Catherine replied.

  ‘Oh my, yes.’

  ‘Let’s see what we can find.’ There was a pause, then Catherine

  said, ‘There’s flour and an egg. A treasure trove. What’s your name?’

  ‘Alice.’

  ‘Well, Alice, do you know how to make pancakes? I think the two of us might be able to work it out together. What do you say? Do you have a skillet?’ Louisa heard the clatter of pans. Then the contractions became more intense and she stopped noticing the sounds outside.

  By the time the baby came, another boy, Catherine and the children were clearing up the dishes and tidying the kitchen. When Louisa emerged, one of them said, ‘We’re cleaning up for Mummy, so she doesn’t feel so bad.’

  ‘She’s feeling much better,’ Louisa said, ‘now that baby’s here.’

  The largest one squealed. ‘Is it a girl?’

  ‘Why don’t you come in and see for yourselves? Softly
now.’

  Louisa looked across at Catherine then. She’d put the kitchen in order, wiped all the children’s hands and faces, and now she was sweeping the floor. She’d started chopping vegetables for a soup, she said, and would like to get it on before they left.

  ‘I’m just not quite sure what goes in soup,’ Catherine said. ‘I assumed water because you drink it.’

  Louisa laughed. ‘Maybe Sally can finish the soup,’ she said. ‘She’ll stay now for the rest of the day.’

  There were five of them, Catherine told Louisa on the way home: Alice was six, Tom five, the twins three. ‘And there was a one-year-old who sat in my lap while I gave him milk from a cup. But they were lovely children, and Alice so grown up. She told me it was her baby coming. The others weren’t old enough to look after a baby but she could. How sweet.’

  ‘Did you enjoy going?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ Catherine said. ‘It’s the first time I’ve felt … useful. I felt useful.’

  ‘Well, you certainly were useful,’ Louisa said. ‘Normally there’s no one there to help with the children. Sally would have gone to them, but it was better to have her with me when we told the mother her baby was breech. She knows Sally.’

  ‘Aunt Louisa, why did you say you’d had a baby?’

  ‘I just wanted to reassure the mother,’ Louisa said quickly.

  ‘But you haven’t,’ Catherine said.

  ‘Of course not,’ Louisa said, more sharply than she intended. She felt fear suddenly, as if she were about to be found out doing something she shouldn’t. She made herself calm, looked at her niece squarely.

  ‘So that was a lie.’

  ‘Well, strictly speaking, yes. But a white lie.’

  ‘What’s a white lie?’

  ‘One you tell to help someone.’ Catherine nodded, seemingly satisfied with Louisa’s answer. She went on to explain why a breech birth was a concern. ‘It’s mostly straightforward, like today, but when it’s not, it can be awful.’

  Catherine seemed hardly to hear Louisa. She was so full of energy. ‘And when their mother was crying out, the little ones looked frightened,’ she said. ‘And I was scared too, because I thought she must have been dying from the sound of it. But Alice, the one I told you about, just said, “Babies hurt coming out.” It settled the rest of them down.’

  ‘Those children loved you,’ Louisa said. She regarded her niece. ‘You were marvellous, Catherine, just marvellous.’

  When they arrived home the sun wasn’t yet up. Catherine went back to bed. Louise stayed up, ostensibly to write up the case notes for the birth, but instead found herself sitting in the dining room, staring at the grate.

  She told no one, not even Ruth Luxton, not until she was sure. The tender breasts, the missed menses, the nausea. She’d heard enough women report the symptoms.

  She debased herself further, went to see him. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Of course I’ll help. We’ll get rid of it.’

  ‘Get rid of it?’ she said. ‘I don’t want to get rid of it. I love you.’

  How could she say that after what he did? She felt sick when she thought of this later, telling him she loved him.

  ‘You must understand,’ he said. ‘I’m married. I have a family. I’m unable to … You know that, Louisa.’

  That was the moment she realised how very alone she was.

  The pregnancy was too far along, she knew, to terminate, and soon it would be obvious to everyone. She went to her mother, who was not unkind. Louisa told Millicent lies, protected him even still. A medical student, she said. The father was a medical student she knew.

  ‘Good God,’ her mother said. ‘Won’t he do the honourable thing? All that study, Louie. How could you?’ But her mother soon stopped asking about the medical student, came up with another plan. Perhaps she guessed the truth. Louisa would go through with the pregnancy, her mother said, and they’d find a family through the local doctor at Aldeburgh who could be trusted to act with discretion.

  The birth was mercifully quick. She’d hardly felt the first contraction before she was on the floor in the bathroom at Aldeburgh.

  She knew her blood pressure was high, had told her mother so. Her mother called the midwife as arranged. ‘All these doctors in the family and we’re calling the midwife,’ was the last thing Louisa said before she lost consciousness. She remembered something; a loud voice. The baby, we’re losing the baby.

  When she recovered, it was Millicent who sat at her bedside, held her hand. ‘The child,’ she said. ‘We lost him. A little boy. A perfect little boy, Louie, stillborn.’ Tears in her poor mother’s eyes. The cord had been wrapped around his neck. There was nothing to be done.

  Afterwards, Louisa would think of the boy as he might have been at various ages; a scallywag, clever, big green eyes, kicking a football in the lane, sick with scarlet fever, roasting chestnuts in Princes Street. Was it wrong that she felt relief more than sadness?

  17

  CATHERINE RUBBED THE WINDOW AND PEERED OUT. Mr Black had sent a car for them again, this time to take them to the airfield at Croydon. She wished she’d eaten something as her stomach was beginning to growl. In the predawn light, she could just make out a long, faded track with a light at the far end. In shadow was what she assumed was their aeroplane. It looked like a giant insect from here.

  Someone emerged from a squat building to their left. It was Andrew, judging by their height.

  ‘Is it safe today, Andrew?’ was the first thing Louisa said when he reached them.

  ‘Hah,’ Andrew said. ‘It’s never safe. I can’t stand it. But you’ll be able to say you’ve flown in an aeroplane.’

  They made their way across to the little building. ‘Our honoured guests,’ Mr Black said when they got inside. ‘Did you see the aeroplane?’

  ‘No,’ Louisa said. ‘There was an aeroplane?’

  He laughed. ‘Well, I’m not going to fly you on my back, Louisa.’

  He introduced them to the two pilots when they came in. The senior of the pair was Heindrick, a big man with a barrel chest and booming voice. ‘These are the girls then,’ was all he said.

  The second pilot, younger, blond hair and blue eyes, was all the way from Canada, Mr Black said. ‘His name is Sam. Just don’t call him an American. It upsets him.’

  Sam came over to Catherine. He wore dark brown wool pants and a leather jacket. He was about Catherine’s height. ‘Have you ever been up before?’

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I can’t wait.’

  ‘This is an easy flight,’ he said. ‘We’ll be there in a couple hours—although Mr Black sometimes takes a detour, so you just never know what’s going to happen. But make sure you look out the window once we’re up.’ He had awfully straight white teeth and kindly eyes.

  Heindrick went out and came back. The luggage had been loaded, he said. ‘We go.’

  There were steps up into the aeroplane. The pilots went up first and into the front of the plane, which was separated by glass doors from the half a dozen canvas chairs that had been nailed to the floor for the passengers. Black took the first row, Andrew beside him, Louisa and Catherine behind. Behind them was the spare tank of fuel—the smell was overpowering. Their luggage was piled on the sides of the plane. The bathroom was a bucket in the back.

  Catherine could see the backs of the pilots’ heads. They wore leather caps now and she watched as Sam put his head out the window, signalling to someone below. After a few minutes, the engine sputtered into life.

  ‘Goodness me, it’s loud!’ Louisa shouted.

  They tracked along at ground level, slowly at first, then turned, picked up speed, the noise of the engines ear-splitting. Catherine could feel the vibrations in every bone of her body. It shook you half apart. They bumped, rose, bumped, rose, bumped and finally rose and were airborne.

  The strange feeling in her stomach as they ascended soon passed. The sun was rising and Catherine could see the earth below them recede. She could make out landmarks, now totally
transformed. A farm, which from the ground might include a farmer with a wife and children, became squares of crops and a little red roof. It made everything simpler, Catherine thought.

  They banked and came back around over the city of London and passed over the Thames. When she saw the Tower Bridge, Catherine thought of the swim she’d done and all the trouble it had caused. She looked over at Louisa. Her aunt looked so fearful, her hands clasped together in her lap, her mouth set, her face pale. Catherine felt a stab of remorse for all the trouble she’d caused, resolved to be better in the future.

  She looked out again at the river, which wound its way through the countryside. It was the only detail she could make out now. It was grey, the water here, like the city itself, nothing like the sea at home, whose water was a pure blue-green from a distance and as clear as glass up close. The Islanders believed the sea was alive. But the river, Catherine had found, was a different kind of creature altogether, not wicked, she thought now, but dark and mysterious.

  Andrew soon stood, ducking his head because of the low ceiling, and went to the back. Catherine could hear him retching.

  She looked out the window again. They were flying over the English Channel. From here it looked so small, as if you could swim it in minutes, she thought. It would be an achievement to be the first woman to swim the Channel, Black had said at his party. Catherine looked down again. It really did look small, for already she could see the green of France.

  Before long, they were over what must be Paris, for she saw the Eiffel Tower she’d seen in books.

  ‘Good Lord, we’re there already,’ Louisa said. Her colour was back, Catherine thought.

  ‘Ain’t it great?’ Black turned around and said. ‘Now, tell me again this will never catch on as a way for getting around the place.’

  They passed Paris to their left and flew to Versailles—to visit his daughter’s school, Mr Black told them. But it turned out that by ‘visiting’ he meant flying low over the ground. They could see the roof of the convent, the spires of the church. And sure enough there were the young women of Saint-Marcel’s waving to them. Mr Black dropped bunches of flowers that had been packed for the purpose and then they climbed again, at Mr Black’s request, to ‘go over some alps, please, fellas, to show the girls,’ before heading back towards Paris.